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From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Cumbrian dialect is a local dialect spoken in Cumbria in northern England, not to be confused with the extinct Celtic languageCumbric that used to be spoken in Cumbria. As in any county, there is a gradual drift in accent towards its neighbours. Barrow-in-Furness (within the historic boundaries of Lancashire) has a similar accent to much of Lancashire whilst the northern parts of Cumbria have a more North-East English sound to them. Whilst clearly being an English accent approximately between Lancashire and Geordie it shares much vocabulary with Scots.

'Cumbrian' here refers both to Cumbria and also to Cumberland, the historic county which, along with Westmorland, has formed the bulk of Cumbria since the enactment of local government re-organisation in 1974. There is a Cumbrian Dictionary of Dialect, Tradition and Folklore, which was written by William Rollinson, but is much harder to find a copy of than the respective dictionaries for Lancashire and Yorkshire.

History of Cumbrian language

Celtic influence

Despite the modern county being created only in 1974 from the counties of Cumberland, Westmorland and north Lancashire and parts of Yorkshire, Cumbria is an ancient land. Before the arrival of the Romans the area was the home of the Carvetii tribe, which was later assimilated to the larger Brigantes tribe. These people would have spoken Brythonic, which developed into Old Welsh, but around the 5th century AD, when Cumbria was the centre of the kingdom of Rheged, the language spoken in northern England and southern Scotland from Lancashire and Yorkshire to Strathclyde had developed into a dialect of Brythonic known as Cumbric (the scarcity of linguistic evidence, however, means that Cumbric's distinctness from Old Welsh is more deduced than proven). Remnants of Brythonic and Cumbric are most often seen in place names, in elements such as caer 'fort' as in Carlisle, pen 'hill' as in Penrith and craig 'crag, rock' as in High Crag.

The most well known Celtic element in Cumbrian dialect is the sheep counting numerals which are still used in various forms by shepherds throughout the area, and apparently for knitting. The word 'Yan' (meaning 'one'), for example, is prevalent throughout Cumbria and is still often used, especially by non-speakers of 'received pronunciation' and children, eg. "That yan owr there," or "Can I have yan of those?"

Before the 8th century AD Cumbria was annexed to English Northumbria and Old English began to be spoken in parts, although evidence suggests Cumbric survived in central regions in some form until the 11th century.

Norse influence

A far stronger influence on the modern dialect was Old Norse, spoken by Norwegian settlers who probably arrived in Cumbria in the 10th century via Ireland and the Isle of Man. The majority of Cumbrian place names are of Norse origin, including Ulverston from Ulfrs tun ('Ulfr's farmstead'), Kendal from Kent dalr ('valley of the River Kent') and Elterwater from eltr vatn ('swan lake'). Many of the traditional dialect words are also remnants of Norse settlement, including beck (bekkr, 'stream'), laik (leik, 'to play'), lowp (hlaupa, 'to jump') and glisky (gliskr, 'shimmering').

Old Norse seems to have survived in Cumbria until fairly late. A 12th century inscription found at Loppergarth in Furness bears a curious mixture of Old English and Norse, showing that the language was still felt in the south of the county at this time, and would probably have hung on in the fells and dales (both Norse words) until later.

Once Cumbrians had assimilated to speaking English, there were few further influences on the dialect. In the Middle Ages, much of Cumbria frequently swapped hands between England and Scotland but this had little effect on the language used. In the nineteenth century miners from Cornwall and Wales began relocating to Cumbria to take advantage of the work offered by new iron ore, copper and wadd mines but whilst they seem to have affected some local accents (notably Barrow-in-Furness) they don't seem to have contributed much to the vocabulary.

One of the lasting characteristics still found in the local dialect of Cumbria today is an inclination to drop vowels, especially in relation to the word "the" which is frequently abbreviated. Unlike the Lancashire dialect, where 'the' is abbreviated to 'th', in Cumbrian (as in Yorkshire) the sound is harder like the letter '?' or simply a 't' and in sentences sounds as if it is attached to the previous word, for example "int'" instead of "in the" "ont'" instead of "on the".

Another common addtion to words is the letter y... Cumbrians often change the way a word spelt and sounded by adding a y as in byat = boat cyak = cake.

Accent and pronunciation

Cumbria is a large area with several relatively isolated districts, so there is quite a large variation in accent, especially between north and south or the coastal towns. There are some uniform features that should be taken into account when pronouncing dialect words.

When certain vowels are followed by the glides/ɹ/ or /l/, an epentheticschwa[ə] is often pronounced between them, creating two distinct syllables:

'feel' > [fiəl]; 'fear' > [fiə]

'fool' > [fuəl]; 'moor' > [muə]

'fail' > [fɪəl]

'file' > [faɪəl]; 'fire' > [faɪə]

The pronunciation of moor, poor, etc is a traditional feature of Received Pronunciation but is now associated with some old-fashioned speakers. It is generally more common in the north of England than in the south. The words cure, pure, sure may be pronounced with a tripthong [ɪuə].

Consonants

Most consonants are pronounced as they are in other parts of the English speaking world. A few exceptions follow:

<g> and <k> have a tendency to be dropped or unreleased in the coda (word- or syllable-finally).

<h> is realised in various ways throughout the county. When William Barrow Kendall wrote his Furness Wordbook in 1867, he wrote that <h> 'should never be dropped',[1] suggesting the practice had already become conspicuous. It seems the elision of both <h> and <t> began in the industrial towns and slowly spread out. In the south, it is now very common.

<l> in the word final position may be dropped or realised as [w]: woowool[wəw]; powpole[pɒw].

<r> is realised as [ɾ] following consonants and in word-initial position but is often elided in the coda, unless a following word begins with a vowel: ross[ɾɒs]; gimmer[gɪmə]; gimmer hogg[gɪməɾ ɒg].

<t> is traditionally always pronounced, although in many places it has been replaced by the glottal stop [ʔ] now common throughout Britain.

<y> may be consonantal [j] as in yamhome[jam]. As the adjectival or adverbial suffix -y it may be [ɪ] or [iː] as in clartymuddy[klaːtɪ]. Medially and, in some cases, finally it is [ɐː] as in Thorfinsty (a place) [ˈθɔːfɪnˌstɐː].

Stress

Stress is usually placed on the initial syllable: yakerenacorn[ˈjakɜɾˌən].

Unstressed initial vowels are usually fully realised, whilst those in final syllables are usually reduced to schwa [ə].

Dialect Words

General words

aboot About

ars I am

as I am (West Cumbria)

how-ee Come on

thew you

you's you (plural) / you are

yat gate

us, es me

wherst where is the

djarn doing (as in 'whut yer djarn? - what are you doing?)

divn't don't (as in 'divn't do that, lad')

hoo'doo How are you doing? (strain of 'How do?')

canna can't (as in 'ye canna djur that!' - 'You can't do that!')

djur do

yon that (when referring to a noun which is visible at the time)

Adjectives

kaylied intoxicated

kystie squeamish or fussy

la'al small

ladgeful embarrassing or unfashionable (only in and around Penrith)

slape slippery or smooth as in slape back colly, a border colly with short wirey hair

yon used when indicating a place or object that is usually in sight but far away. abbreviation of yonder.

Adverbs

barrie good

geet very

gey very

owwer over ("ars garn owwer yonder fer a kip" - I'm going over there for a sleep)

secca such a

vanna almost, nearly.

Nouns

bab'e baby

bait packed meal that is carried to work

bait bag bag in which to carry bait

bar pound (money) (used in Carlisle)

biddies fleas or head lice or old people "old biddies"

bift/bifter cannabis joint

britches trousers

byat boat

cheble or chable table

clowt/cluwt fanny (Penrith)hit "al clout ya yan"

cyak cake

cur dog sheepdog - collie

fratch argument or squabble

fyass face

dukars Swimming Trunks

garn thread for knitting (Furness)

jinnyspinner A Daddy Long Legs

kets sweets

lewer money

meby maybe

peeve drink (alcoholic)

push iron bicycle

scran food

scrow a mess

shillies small stones or gravel

skemmy beer

snig small eel

wol hole (Maryport)

wuk work, as in: as garn twuk (I'm going to work)

yam home, as in: as garn yam (I'm going home)

Verbs

bowk retch (as in before vomiting)

bray beat (as in beat up someone)

bubble cry

chess chase

chor steal (Romany origin, cf. Urdu chorna)

clarten messing about

deek look (Romany origin, cf Urdu dekhna)

doss play (wanna doss hide and seek? - Do you wish to play hide and seek?)

firtle to mess about, to waste time

fistle to fidget

gander look

gar / gaa go

garn / gaan going

howk to pick at or gouge out

hoy throw

jarn or jurn doing

laik play

lait look for

liggin lying down

lowp jump

nash run away

radge to be angry

ratch to search for something

scop to throw

scower look at

sow sexual intercourse

skit make fun of

Smowk smoking ("As garrn out for a smowk")

twat hit someone ("I twatted him in the face")

twine to whine or complain

wukn working

People

bairden child

boyo brother/male friend (Carlisle)

buwler/bewer ugly girl

cus or cuz friend (from cousin) (East Cumbria)

gammerstang awkward person

mot woman/girl/girlfriend

offcomer a non-native in Cumbria

potter gypsy

gadgey man

charva man/friend (West Cumbria, Carlisle)

marra friend (West Cumbria, Furness)

t'ol fella father

t'ol lass mother

our lass wife/girlfriend

jam eater describing someone from Workington- originated as a result from coal mining - it is said that some miners won the right to food provided by the employer, so their employer provided it - in the form of jam sandwiches.

Farming terms

boos a division in a shuppon

cop the bank of earth on which a hedge grows

dyke raised bank, often topped with a hedge. Many small roads are flanked by dykes

Barrow-in-Furness

Barrow-in-Furness is unique within Cumbria and the local dialect tends to be more Lancashire orientated. Like Liverpool this is down to the large numbers of settlers from various regions (including predominantly Scotland, elsewhere in England and Ireland amongst other locations). In general the Barrovian dialect tends to drop certain letters (including h and t) for example holiday could be pronounced as 'oliday, and with the drop of the h there is more emphasis on the letter o. Another example is with the letter t where twenty is often pronounced twen'y (again an emphasis on the n could occur).

Cumbrian numbers

The Cumbrian numbers, often called 'sheep counting numerals' because of their (declining) use by shepherds to this very day, show clear signs that they may well have their origins in Cumbric. The table below shows the variation of the numbers throughout Cumbria, as well as the relevant cognate in Welsh and Cornish, which are the two geographically closest British languages to Cumbric, for comparison.

NB: when these numerals were used for counting sheep, reputedly, the shepherd would count to fifteen or twenty and then move a small stone from one of his pockets to the other before beginning again, thus keeping score. Numbers eleven, twelve etc. would have been 'yandick, taendick', while sixteen and seventeen would have been 'yan-bumfit, tyan-bumfit' etc.

Although yan is still widely used, wan is starting creep into some sociolects of the area.

Survey of English Dialects sites

There were several villages in Cumbria that were used during the Survey of English Dialects to minutely detail localised dialects. At the time, Cumbria did not exist as a unit of local government; there were 12 sites within modern Cumbria spread across four different counties: